Activities were designed with the help of mental-health professionals, family doctors, social workers and crisis-intervention professionals. Every week, each counsellor meets with three mental-health experts to discuss behavioural problems they've observed.

But this is not a counselling camp, stresses El-Baba. The biggest goal is to let these kids be kids, and have the opportunity to let loose and have fun.

Soft-spoken 11-year-old Hanin Jaamour says she's learning a lot, and that's easing some of her anxiety about attending school in the fall.

She and her family landed in Toronto in February, and she went to school for three months. But she didn't like it at all.

"Everything is different," she says in Arabic, with El-Baba translating.

She's excited about entering Grade 6, but she's also scared.

"This year it's going to be harder for English because we're going to be learning more things," she frets.

"Here it's a very diverse culture, you have many people coming from various different countries and backgrounds and religions. Back home we don't have the mixing of boys and girls and this is completely new, which is amazing."

Camp supervisor Windemere Jarvis, the only counsellor who doesn't speak Arabic, says she's impressed by how eager the kids are to learn new customs.

They've opened their hearts and bared their souls everyday, she says, pointing to painful anecdotes about bombings, destroyed homes, and grief that can send her home "crying all night."

"I was talking to a friend of mine and they said, 'You know what, I think the most important thing is when you hear these stories is not to cry because that is their reality. Just let them talk and let them know that what happened to them was OK and that they're here now and we want them to be super happy here and feel like this is safe,'" says Jarvis.

The athletic 21-year-old has taken a keen interest in boosting self-esteem among the girls, noting that a clear gender bias towards the boys "is very visible."

"The other day we lined them up and immediately all the boys went to the front of the line and the girls went behind them," she notes.

She worries about how the boys might be disciplined for such behaviour at a Toronto school unfamiliar with Syrian culture.

"It's not their fault," she says, envisioning repeated trips to the principal's office for something they don't understand.

Jarvis says she tries to introduce new ideas by showing them girls can do anything and by recognizing and praising female achievements.

"And I think that they definitely — the girls especially — want to be empowered and they want to change. Because (after) coming here (to Canada), that's what's going to happen to them."

It hasn't been easy. Teaching even basic classroom etiquette has been a challenge, admits El-Baba.

Kids at this camp will simply slip out of the room if they need to use the bathroom. Or they'll try to open the emergency exit while the school bus is moving.

"It's not like they don't want to obey the rules, it's because they just don't quite understand it," says El-Baba.

"They haven't had that same structure back home and now this is all new to them where they're organized into groups and they have to follow a certain schedule, they have to go to the washroom at a certain time."

At H.appi Camp, there are classes on leadership, and how to speak confidently in a group. There are discussions about diversity and human rights, the environment, and volunteerism.

Other courses focus on how to resolve conflict, how to work in a team, and how to build friendships and trust.

Admission is free but the waiting list is 200-kids long.

El-Baba says the month-long program is largely funded through a $36,000 federal grant. Private donations help pay for buses and transportation, a couple of food banks have supplied drinks and snacks, and Canadian Tire has donated sporting equipment.

But art supplies dwindled after just the first week, and El-Baba says they're running out of cash.

He hopes to generate more money to fund a followup program once school starts. That project would see counsellors visit each family weekly to check up on how the kids are faring academically, socially, and psychologically.

El-Baba is optimistic about their futures.

"I was shocked and amazed by how resilient they are," he says, rattling off the stories he's heard that end with death or violence.

"Hopefully by the end of this month they'll have an idea there's other things in the world that they still haven't learnt or experienced that are good."

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Numbers That Show There's Much More To Do To Help Syrian Refugees

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More than 10 million Syrians have been forced out of their homes due to the conflict, becoming either “internally displaced” or fleeing altogether, according to Amnesty International.

The UNHCR’s latest figures show the crisis is getting worse. More than 7.6m Syrians have been displaced within the country by the conflict, fleeing to safer areas.

By December 2014, 3.8 million Syrians had fled the country altogether. They sought refuge in Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq and Egypt. A sizeable proportion then make the perilous journey to Europe.
These numbers may well have increased since the last count, given the advance of Isis and the continued battle between rebel groups and pro-government forces.

The Gulf Cooperation Council's oil-rich states of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates accept very few refugees and asylum seekers from Syria.
Since 2011, the UNHCR has supported 63 Syrians with asylum applications in the countries – but just 33 were accepted, despite the UN's support.
Amnesty International has called Gulf states’ contribution “shocking”, the states themselves say they are providing thousands of visitor visas for Syrians, but also protecting against the threat of Islamist extremist attacks.

Full Fact reports that Britain has granted asylum to just under 5,000 Syrians in the initial decision made on their applications since 2011.
In addition, 216 Syrian refugees have been resettled in the UK.
Resettlement includes transferring refugees from Syria to the UK – whilst a person has to be in a country to claim asylum there.

Aside from Germany, the other 27 EU nations have pledged just 6,305 places to Syrians to resettle, last year. That’s 0.17% of the number of refugees that have fled Syria.
While EU nations are likely to significantly increase the number of resettlement places this year – Germany still takes a lion’s share of those seeking refuge.

Amnesty International says that – by June 2015 – only 2.2% of Syrian refugees have been offered places to resettle by the international community. That’s less than 90,000.
And money is short too. “The UN’s humanitarian appeal for Syrian refugees was only 23% funded as of the 3 June,” it wrote.

In 1951, 145 nations ratified the Refugee Convention governing the treatment of those fleeing persecution.
Yet just a fraction of these have offered to help so far.